In addition to the passenger seats, aircraft cabins of passenger aircraft also comprise fixtures which are provided for use by the crew or the passengers of the aircraft. Such fixtures in an aircraft passenger cabin comprise for example storage lockers, toilets, galleys, bar fixtures, dividing walls etc. and are also referred to as monuments. Due to the naturally restricted space available in aircraft cabins, such monuments have a very integrated and compact structure and are additionally frequently provided as integral modules.
Such monuments are typically anchored in a fixed position on the housing thereof in a corresponding installation position inside the aircraft cabin. For example, a metal perforated rail can be mounted on a housing upper surface of a monument by means of screws, which upper surface in turn can be fastened to a primary structure of the aircraft by means of additional metal components, such as mounting brackets, connecting rods or the like. In order to allow as flexible attachment as possible, such perforated rails can be provided with regularly spaced holes, in which the additional connection elements can be fixed in a longitudinal direction of the rail at regular intervals. Conventionally, such components for fastening monuments are produced from aluminium or a corresponding metal or metal alloy, for example by means of an extrusion process.
DE 10 2005 054 890 A1 and U.S. Pat. No. 8,528,859 B2 describe for example systems for fixing monuments in position in aircraft cabins, in which a plurality of individual metal components are used for fastening. The system from DE 10 2005 054 890 A1 thus provides a system carrier for fixing interior fitting components at the heads thereof, which is fastened to a fuselage by means of a plurality of formers and is equipped with a plurality of fastening means for connecting the interior fitting components. Furthermore, said system provides at least one fastening rail which is located in a cabin floor, which extends in parallel with the system carrier and along which are located corresponding fastening means for fixing the interior fitting components at the feet thereof.
However, for the purpose of weight reduction, the cabin components of modern passenger aircraft are increasingly constructed from fibre composite materials. For example, the housing walls of monuments are sometimes structured in sandwich constructions. In the case of the sandwich panels used here, a core structure made of synthetic polymer paper arranged in the manner of honeycomb, such as aramid paper or the like, is conventionally surrounded by plane-parallel cover layers which are applied on both sides. The cover layers can be formed for example by a fibre-reinforced plastics material, such as a glass-fibre-reinforced phenol resin or a carbon-fibre-reinforced epoxy resin. In this case, the core structure can alternatively also be formed from a rigid foam, such as a polymethacrylimide rigid foam (PMI rigid foam). Such designs of the walls of monument housings are characterised inter alia by a low weight, high stability and good heat- and/or sound-insulation properties. In contrast to these light composite components, the metal components of a monument fastening have a relatively high weight.
Finished sandwich panels can be processed further for the assembly of a monument housing, by inserting or adhering metal inserts to form screw-in connections, hinges, articulations or the like so that the panels can be interconnected. Further functions are typically likewise only installed retroactively in already finished sandwich panels, e.g. door-locking systems. Inter alia, ducts can be milled or drilled into the sandwich panels in order to be able to lay cooling pipes, electrical cables or the like.
Modern processes for producing sandwich panels are sometimes based on flow production. For example, U.S. 2002/0014302 A1 describes a pultrusion process for producing sandwich panels with integrated reinforcing elements. Furthermore, fibres or fibre layers can be sewed or introduced into the core of sandwich panels in order to further improve the rigidity and stability thereof.